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New Richmond girl, 14, charged with attempted homicide

A minor girl was transported from a home located in the Hwy. K trailer court east of the city of New Richmond Wednesday, July 27. (photo by Raymond T. Rivard)

A New Richmond teenager rode her bicycle 11 miles to the home of her brother’s girlfriend, slipped inside, awakened the girl and went on an hours-long assault that included cutting the victim’s throat before leaving her for dead, according to charges filed Thursday in St. Croix County Circuit Court.

The suspect, identified in a criminal complaint as 14-year-old Kali J. Bookey, was charged as an adult with one count of attempted first-degree homicide.

St. Croix County Circuit Court Judge Eric Lundell ordered Bookey to be held in an Eau Claire juvenile facility without bond. Releasing her from custody “would not adequately protect members of the public from serious bodily harm,” he said.

Bookey’s attorney, Barbara Miller, had asked for her client to be released from custody and to remain under family supervision.

Wisconsin state law allows juveniles older than 10 who are accused of first-degree homicide or attempted first-degree homicide to be tried as adults.

The victim, a 15-year-old town of Stanton resident, remained hospitalized Thursday at Regions Hospital in St. Paul.

Scott Knudson, chief deputy for the St. Croix County Sheriff’s Office, said the girl sustained “very serious injuries.”

“If we didn’t find her when we did, I think there was the potential for them to be fatal,” he said.

St. Croix County sheriff’s deputies were called Wednesday morning to a home on 134th Street in the town of Star Prairie for an attempted abduction report.

According to a criminal complaint:

Bookey told deputies there that she had been assaulted by two men wearing ski masks. In an attempt to ward off the assailants, Bookey told them they should go to the home of her brother’s girlfriend -- 1442 County Road K, Lot No. 13.

Deputies went to that house, opened the door and called inside. They were greeted by someone calling for help, saying she needed an ambulance.

The 15-year-old victim was found lying inside the home bleeding heavily from her face and neck. She was taken to Westfields Hospital in New Richmond, where -- after first telling officers she didn’t know who attacked her -- she identified Bookey as the assailant.

‘Die right now’ or ‘bleed out’

The victim said she was sleeping in bed when she was awakened by someone putting their hands over her mouth. She at first thought it was her boyfriend “playing around,” so she shoved back, but said her attacker then tried covering her nose and mouth.

That led to a struggle, with the girls going to the floor and Bookey beating the girl in the face and head, leaving the girl on the verge of passing out.

The girl said Bookey got up, got two bowls, came back and smashed them over her head. Bookey used broken shards from the bowls to cut the girl. Bookey didn’t stop until the victim called her by name.

The girl told Bookey she needed water, “and the defendant replied that if she got some water, in return, she would get to cut (the victim’s) throat.” The girl said she was “incredibly thirsty and assumed that she was going to die, so she agreed,” the complaint states.

Bookey later asked the victim if she wanted to “die right now” or “bleed out,” according to the complaint -- to which the girl said she’d prefer to bleed to death.

“The defendant then stopped cutting her,” the complaint states.

The girl said Bookey unfurled her plot before leaving, telling her how she had biked past her house and taken note of times people came and went. Bookey referred to herself as “a psychopath and that (the victim) was her first kill and she was probably going to kill again,” the complaint states.

As Bookey was leaving, the victim told her to have a nice day.

“Have a nice afterlife,” the complaint states Bookey replied.

Suspect’s account

Investigators also interviewed Bookey, who began by telling the story about masked men. She claimed at the time that she sent the men to the victim, whom she admitted to hating because her brother became happier with the girlfriend.

In an interview later with St. Croix County sheriff’s Lt. Cathy Borgschatz, Bookey said she left her house at about 4 a.m. Wednesday and rode 11 miles to the victim’s home in an effort to scare the girl and her mother enough to move away.

Bookey said she entered the home through an unlocked sliding glass door at about 6:20 a.m. and first waited in the living room, where she conducted breathing exercises. After getting her breathing under control and wearing rubber gloves, she went into the girl’s bedroom.

Bookey admitted to jumping on the girl and landing 20-30 blows before taking the bowls and smashing them over her head. She also admitted to tossing a cellphone that the victim was attempting to use. Bookey said she remained silent during the attack in hopes of remaining anonymous to the victim.

Bookey admitted to stuffing items under the girl’s mouth in order to silence her so she could leave.

The victim fought back, Bookey said, claiming that she used the broken bowls shards “in self defense,” the complaint states.

Bookey, who was also treated at Westfields, had swollen and bruised hands, scrapes on her knees, cuts and scrapes on her legs and dried blood on her face and, arms, hands and legs. She appeared in court Thursday with a large bandage on her right hand.

Bookey admitted to Borgschatz that she cut the girl’s throat with a bowl shard at least four times.

“She said she wanted (the victim) to pass out from blood loss, and then she would get help to (the victim) so she did not die,” the complaint states.

Bookey said she later plotted with the victim a way for her to keep from getting caught -- she forced girl to leave a voice memo for her boyfriend describing an attack by masked men.

During the second hour of the incident, Bookey said she gave the girl water and a blanket after the victim said she was getting cold.

Bookey later told Borgschatz she had been thinking about the attack for the past week and a half, and rode her bike past the house three days the previous week.

“She was making a plan to hurt (the victim) and went on other bike rides, thinking about what she was going to do,” the complaint states.

Mike Longaecker is the regional public safety reporter for RiverTown Multimedia. His coverage area spans St. Croix and Pierce counties. Longaecker served from 2011-2015 as editor of the Woodbury Bulletin. A University of Wisconsin-River Falls graduate, Longaecker previously reported for the Red Wing Republican Eagle and for the Forum Communications Minnesota Capitol Bureau. You can follow him on Twitter at @Longaecker